May. 14th, 2016

[Tethys Lockdown]

[A while after the initial chaos, well into the lockdown. The fleeing crowds have, er, died out a little. So aside from the alarms, the floor above ground zero is quiet, almost pensive, as if waiting--until a burst of static rips across the hallway intercom system, followed by the ominous sound of steel doors clanging shut in unison, all over the level. A new, localized alarm begins to sound somewhere nearby.]

May. 2nd, 2016

New club opening [backdated: Saturday night]

Who: AnyoneWhat: New openingWhere: The roadhouse

The grand opening is advertizing. Flyers on noticeboards and a radio spot on the local station and a note on the forums that just says Lux: open Saturday. When it opens, there's a trickle of people from the Capital who are curious about small-town attempts at big city clubs and the trickle is enough for steady business.

Inside it's very different to burlesque velvet and beads, luxury oozing off the walls. It's pared down industrial, and lights and the music played is layered, modern with piano threaded over and through until you can't pull apart the classic from the newly invented. The piano? That's in the pit, lowered seating comfortable enough to get comfortable and a side-on view of the piano player. It's bigger on the inside than it looks on the out, optical illusion or just good interior decoration and as guilt-money tokens go? It's pretty impressive.

The opening night, the bartenders are still learning. There's laughter over music, and the servers circulate, all in black determined to ensure a good night.

Apr. 18th, 2016

News

[The roadhouse across town, the kind with the velvet and the lights and the air of dusty sex appeal? Yeah, that's cleared out. There's a trash heap out front for the garbage men, and the whine of industrial tools inside. Velvet swags are in the trash can now and nobody's slinking around to music. The only sign out front is one that says 'closed for refurbishment', and an approximate opening time. 'Soon'. The job ads hit the paper the next issue. Bartenders, DJ and a piano player.]

Jan. 22nd, 2016

She was a sinner and a terrible one, because she didn't give a goddamn. Juliet didn't believe in churches or prayers or in the good of others. She'd fished around in the sea of humanity and found too much dross and shit to think prayer would give her a line to anything good. She hadn't come near a church in years - sanctified ground, and Juliet James? There's a punch-line to that. But she came now. Answers were threatening on the horizon to questions that had been stamped down, smothered like the grass under the snow. She wore boots, laced over thick socks and she blew clouds of steamed breath and smoke over the thick puff of a black scarf knotted around her throat. It was the concession to the weather; leather jacket with shoulders made for cities instead of quiet church-yards.

Answers. God, she hadn't even thought of the fucking questions in years and she was uncomfortable now, sober-stale breath and cigarettes in cold-shaky fingers and defiant-red painted mouth in narrow face. Repose was forgotten, new layered over the old like a palimpsest, with the barest traces like hollows or shadows instead of memories. She didn't know if her mother or father had been church-going, God-fearing folk. Or if they'd prayed to the devil.

She sucked an ashed breath, ignored the desire to circle back via booze and waited, boots scuffed on snow for Eddie.